ASIDE: This post gets political. People may agree or disagree based on their own experience or personal belief. I accept that. I’m attempting to use evidence and analytical rigor to reach my conclusions while averting my own bias. If you think I missed the mark on those aspects (evidence or rigor) feel free to reach out to me. If you just disagree with my conclusions then I’d love to see a blog post exploring your own evidence and process....

From the New York Times: “Review: ‘Hamilton,’ Young Rebels Changing History and Theater” Give it a second, I’ll explain the Hamilton reference to DFIR, but for now let me share one of my favorite songs. Aaron Burr thinks Alexander Hamilton is a brash aggressive brute and believes Hamilton thinks him slow and unwilling to make a decision. Burr then sings this song to explain his true goals: Wait for It by the cast of Hamilton...

One thing I constantly harp on while talking to people beginning in the security community is the importance of learning to code. I think it is awful that we have so many security professionals cannot write a line of code. It’s useful for automating common tasks, gathering & manipulating data, almost anything you can imagine. I think everyone should learn some coding and Python is the best place to start....

One of the hardest things when starting a threat intelligence program is deciding where to start collection. This begins with an initial set of requirements and evolves from there. Everyone will give you a different opinion and insist on a different approach probably biased by their favorite collection sources. As for me I think the best approach is to start with the small things, the easy things, and build up from there....

One of my goals for this year was getting comfortable with a new programming language. I’ve been a Python devotee for a long time and it’s almost always gets the job done, but I wanted a little bit more. There are times Python works against you: Dependency Nightmares: While virtualenv and a requirements.txt file work ok for developers it can often make use by non-developers or some deployment stories quite complicated....

Requirements. The first part of the intelligence cycle and the most neglected. According to the appendix of Joint Publication 2–0: Joint Intelligence intelligence requirement._ 1. Any subject, general or specific, upon which there is a need for the collection of information, or the production of intelligence. 2. A requirement for intelligence to fill a gap in the command’s knowledge or understanding of the operational environment or threat forces._ Intelligence requirements (or just requirements) are key questions (as @cyint_dude calls them) that stakeholders (the CERT, leadership, etc) want the intelligence team to answer....

I admit it… I’m a fanboy. A straight up osquery fanboy. Oh… what is osquery you ask? Good question there sport. osquery allows you to easily ask questions about your Linux and OSX infrastructure. Whether your goal is intrusion detection, infrastructure reliability, or compliance, osquery gives you the ability to empower and inform a broad set of organizations within your company. That’s how Facebook describes it. I’d say osquery is the most effective way available to monitor an OSX or Linux host for security....

Last year I was lucky enough to go to the FIRST2015 conference in Berlin. It was a great conference, good talks (including yours truly), and an even better hallway track. I’d never been to Berlin, or Germany in general, and I enjoyed seeing this amazing city a little bit as well. Traveling to a new country as a security minded person is always a bit jarring. Even a country as friendly as Germany bares consideration when it comes to laptops, tablets, phones, etc....

While not being much for New Years Resolutions (though I do love fireworks) last year I shared some professional goals. I even advocated accountability. I figure I should share how I did. Professional Goals Read one technical book a month: I think I read about 6? We had a fun little reading group that lasted until summer. Blog at least once a week: I was doing well until June. I have an excuse, but I’ll share that another time....

One of my favorite things is talking to students and people new to the security field. It feels like yesterday I was wandering around the first Shmoocon as a student in awe of the people I met and the work they were doing. Now I’m 10 years into my career and have a whole different perspective (though still in awe with those folks). Starting a career in infosec isn’t easy and while there are better general introductions I wanted to add my perspective on getting started in Digital Forensics and Incident Response (DFIR)....